1. Field
The present disclosure relates to the production of livestock feed and more particularly pertains to a new system and method for processing crop materials into livestock feed for providing a feed that is more readily digested by livestock, such as ruminant animals, and that particularly provides fiber that is more effectively digested by the animal.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Crop materials may be harvested and processed to produce silage, and sometimes a forage harvester apparatus is used to harvest the crop materials from the field and perform some degree of processing of the crop materials in a manner that facilitates the formation of the silage before the materials are loaded into a storage container such as a silo or bag for fermentation. Typically, although not necessarily, the processing of the crop materials performed by the forage harvester includes cutting or chopping the crop materials into small pieces and crushing the crop materials to open the kernels present in the harvested materials.
Often the forage harvester includes a cutting or chopping stage and a processing stage. The apparatus of the chopping stage may include a drum or cutterhead that has a plurality of knives that are positioned in a spaced relationship along the circumference of the drum to cut the crop materials as the materials pass over a stationary shear bar inside the harvester. In many cases, the crop materials are cut into pieces that are relatively short, in the range of approximately 0.375 inches (approximately 9.5 mm) to approximately 0.75 inches (approximately 19 mm) long. The chopped crop material then moves to the apparatus of the processing stage which typically includes a pair of relatively closely spaced and generally cylindrical rolls with teeth that are intended to crush and open the kernels in the crop material to enhance the nutritional availability of the kernels in the resultant feed.